At Jewish Museum, tech is art and vice versa

By Jessica Zack

Published 10:56 am, Tuesday, November 3, 2015

Photo: Courtesy Of Alan Rath And Hosfel

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Alan Rath's "Voyeur III," 2007 (fiberglass, aluminum, Gâ€10, custom electronics, LCDs) is among the digital artwork in "NEAT: New Experiments in Art and Technology," on view at the Contemporary Jewish Museum through January 17, 2016.
Credit: Courtesy of Alan Rath and Hosfelt Gallery, San Francisco less

Alan Rath's "Voyeur III," 2007 (fiberglass, aluminum, Gâ€10, custom electronics, LCDs) is among the digital artwork in "NEAT: New Experiments in Art and Technology," on view at the Contemporary Jewish ... more

Photo: Courtesy Of Alan Rath And Hosfel

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Gabriel L. Dunne and Vishal K. Dar's pulsing "NAAG XY," 2015 (multi-channel projections, EPS foam, plaster) is among the digital artwork in "NEAT: New Experiments in Art and Technology," on view at the Contemporary Jewish Museum through January 17, 2016.
Credit: Courtesy of Gabriel L. Dunne and Vishal K. Dar less

Gabriel L. Dunne and Vishal K. Dar's pulsing "NAAG XY," 2015 (multi-channel projections, EPS foam, plaster) is among the digital artwork in "NEAT: New Experiments in Art and Technology," on view at the ... more

Photo: Courtesy Of Gabriel L. Dunne And

At Jewish Museum, tech is art and vice versa

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If artist Robert Rauschenberg and Bell Labs engineer Billy Kluver were still alive today to visit the Contemporary Jewish Museum’s new exhibition, “NEAT: New Experiments in Arts and Technology,” it’s a fair bet they would both be pleased to see the once-radical ideas they espoused in the 1960s — about breaking down barriers between artists and engineers — thriving in the current work of the Bay Area digital artists on display.

The dynamic, multigenerational new exhibition at CJM features nine local artists and artistic teams working with light, sound, robotic sculpture and the remarkable abstract effects of algorithms themselves. “NEAT” was organized by chief curator Renny Pritikin (assisted by artist Paolo Salvagione) as a conscious follow-up to the landmark Experiments in Arts and Technology (EAT) of 50 years ago, which were spearheaded by Rauschenberg, Kluver, artist Robert Whitman and engineer Fred Waldhauer.

Those groundbreaking performances and collaborations between artists and techies paved the way for the kind of work “NEAT” highlights: Jim Campbell’s mural-scale projections; Camille Utterback’s interactive, painting-like video installation; and the mesmerizing, pulsing rhythms of Gabriel Dunne and Vishal K. Dar’s playful projection-mapped sculpture.

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“Our exhibition makes the argument that in those 50 years (since EAT’s inaugural projects) there have been basic changes (to the interplay of digital and arts culture),” says Pritikin. “First, the center of this activity has moved from New York to the Bay Area. It’s been going on here now for 40 years. And, second, and even more interestingly, artists don’t need to be paired with engineers anymore. They are now one and the same.”

Explaining the exhibition’s relevance to CJM, Pritikin says “NEAT” exists not only at the intersection of art and technology but also “at the crossroads where contemporary art and Judaism meet. Innovation and an openness to ideas are central to Jewish thought. One of the central ideas of Judaism is that creation is unfinished, and it is people’s job to complete creation, to heal the Earth. Of course to do that, people need the best tools available and to be in touch with new ideas about science and the world.”

Salvagione, who has an engineering background, was artist in residence at Autodesk when approached by Pritikin to help put together a roster of younger Bay Area digital artists for “NEAT.” “I was inspired by the desire to do a water-based work in a museum setting,” he says, standing in the exhibition’s first gallery before his hypnotic “Rope Fountain.”

Using 3-D-printed housings, a loop of nylon rope, motors, electronics and programming code, the installation creates surprisingly active line drawings of shadows in space as the rope circles continuously. It captivates visitors’ attention as they enter the exhibition. “It is, at its most basic, a rope and a motor and some code,” says Salvagione, “but the effect makes it feel like it’s floating, like magic.”

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